A rare sighting in vintage metal kitchen cabinets: a swing-out, lazy-susan-style door set into a blind corner in this set of vintage metal Genevas. Even mega expert 52PostnBeam says: “I’ve seen something like that only once before … and you know I saved a photo of it! purty neat.” 52PnB’s blue cabinet seems even wackier, because the door doesn’t appear to go all the way to the kickplate/floor. The ivory or white set that I spotted is in a listing over on our steel cabinet buy/sell Forum. Ergh, I can’t find the listing now, and I can’t get the PDF to pdrats. It’s in there somewhere….
Blind corner lazy susans in vintage metal kitchen cabinets: rare sighting
Posted by: • January 6, 2011
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The blue cabinet is a St. Charles, and it is called a ‘Swing Shelf Corner Unit’. I have the exact same cabinet as the blue one and there are actually 2 doors that swing out — not just one. If you look closly at the blue cab. photo you can just see the handle peeking out for the door below.
We had a corner lazy susan in our metal kitchen (American Kitchens Pioneer–very attractive, the cabinet doors were solid wood). It was somewhat different than these. The door was not full-size relative to the others, and it operated by pressing a button shaped like the pulls on the lower cabinets, which were round. I used to love to mess around with the lazy susan when I was little, because the mechanism made such a great and satisfying click noise when it operated–plus, then you got to spin it around to look at all the cans. Good times!
You are going to dig mine, then! St. Charles, 1950s, a DOUBLE blind lazy susan!
http://katemckinnon.wordpress.com/2011/01/06/st-charles-metal-cabinets-in-my-kitchen/
woooooo, impressed i am!
I have 2 sets of those (4 altogether) in my 1957 blue St. Charles kitchen. They slide out smoothly as though they were brand new. They are just a little difficult to clean the insides behind the lazy susan — but well worth it.
Esti
Looks like Sara and Kate have the same double door as the blue rusted one — I love these because they make use of that otherwise wasted space, plus it’s a huge bonus to have items out in the open, as opposed to searching around on a spinning lazy susan (fun as it may be for the kids).
Anyone know why St. Charles don’t have attached kick plates like other cabinets? All the disassembled St. Ch I’ve seen don’t have a base, making them only about 30″ high. I’m going to guess they’re left off so the installer can customize the counter height (higher up for tall people, for example) … however, it’s another bit of work and something to keep in mind for the old budget …
I do not know the answer to the kickplate question, 52pnb. I surmise your hypothesis is correct, though… I’ll keep an eye out for the answer . I have lot of vintage St. Charles marketing materials…just need to read them rather than just look at the photos!
Such fun information! I didn’t realize they are rare. I’m pretty sure I have 2 of these waiting to be installed. A huge set of St. Charles with wood doors are patiently waiting in our garage to be installed. (Taking prime realestate in a garage in cold WI!) Once the bathroom is done, those babies are next!
Our kitchen has a normal lazy susan and it took me a while to find a Geneva set that had one. I thought they were kinda hard to come by, but man, these look even more rare.
Yes, I really wanted two lazy susans for my kitchen, too. The RDGs did not deem me worthy, they had already delivered a lot. Lost space, alas.
we are young homeowners learning about our house and getting very excited about mid century modern design – we totally have these painted steel cabinets!
question: how do you clean fingerprints/oil buildup off of them? i tried a conventional cleaning product and it seems to have left faint streaks, perhaps taking off the gloss finish from the cabinets? is there anything i can do about those streaks to restore the shine, and how should i clean the doors in the future?
thanks!! love this website!!!!
kris, to clean my cabinets we used very vine grade auto body compound, a rag and a buffer – finishing off with a new coat of turtle wax. you might also try deabath.com’s cleaner page and/or contact them for tips. also please note: there can be lead in old paint on these cabinets – consult a pro and educate yourself.